Supply tightness in key commodities such as chemicals, polymers, lumber and steel has been a major story of 2021, but increasingly logistics are taking centre stage in this story as production of many materials ramps up only to find difficulties in moving products downstream to customers. Shortages seen in the plastics and chemicals markets are […]
Chemical Connections
Can consumers afford the price rises commodities are portending?
Get ready to open your wallets a bit more. Whether you are in the chemical business, the services industry or the business of feeding people, the cost of business continues to rise. As those costs rise, so too are the number of questions surrounding the emergence of inflation into economies hoping to emerge from the […]
End result of Biden’s ambitious infrastructure proposal may underwhelm
Reinvestment in infrastructure has finally made it to centre stage of US political discussions, but prepare to be underwhelmed by what ultimately results from what will be a partisan debate over a subject that on its surface should not be contentious. This blog previously has expressed optimism that a large investment in US infrastructure renewal […]
Immense challenges facing chemical, polymer procurers
Mid-February’s prolonged freeze on the Texas-Louisiana coast has juiced up market commentary as much as it has most petrochemical and polymer pricing. Just days after the storm, a polyethylene (PE) trader said that the freeze’s effects on regional and global supplies would be “worse than Hurricane Harvey”. Perhaps so, because not long after, a PE […]
Great news buried beneath recent vaccine headlines
With news bubbling up about coronavirus variants, here is a variant message of my own: Look past the recent coronavirus headlines and you will find some extremely hopeful developments. The remarkably high efficacy rates for the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines quickly spoiled us after health experts for months said that anything over 50% effective would […]
Three markets to watch amid stimulus efforts
The Democrat Party sweep of the Georgia runoff senatorial elections this week means President-elect Joseph Biden will take office on 20 January with his party in control of both houses of Congress and thus an easier path to enacting the policies on which he campaigned. The blog previously outlined some possibilities for pandemic-recovery economic stimulus […]
3 stimulus possibilities under the Biden administration
US president-elect Joseph Biden has called the recently passed $900bn second round of coronavirus-related economic stimulus a down-payment to what he will promote passage of after he is sworn into office on 20 January 2021. What that third round of stimulus will look like will be shaped in part by the two 5 January 2021 […]
Deteriorating playing conditions mandate quick changes of plans
A lot can change in 30 days. Thirty days ago, US President Donald Trump felt confident he was on his way to a second term, while election opponent Joseph Biden felt he was on the way to his first term on the back of a host of polling data showing him possibly leading a “blue […]
All roads following US elections should lead to enactment of infrastructure bill
Finding common ground for US Republicans and Democrats is as difficult as ever during these hyper-partisan times, but if there has been one subject that has ventured into that rarified air, it is the need to reinvest in the country’s infrastructure. But while both Republican President Donald Trump and his Democrat opposition have signaled their […]
Plastic rubbish: the pandemic is increasing rather than reducing the pressure for change
This is the first of a series of blog posts where I will examine the environmental paradigm shift and what it means for the petrochemicals industry. This first post deals with the bottom end of the value chain, the plastic packaging business, and the pressure being exerted upward on petrochemicals producers to change how they […]
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